The latest iPhone may have a 4" screen, but it's basically the same old tried and true design

When it comes to next generation iPhone devices, it appears that Apple just can't plug the leaks of information to the public. In the case of the iPhone 4, a prototype was lost in a bar and subsequently wound up in the hands of Gizmodo. With the iPhone 4S -- and now with the "New iPhone" -- the leaks came from suppliers.

The latest leak on the "New iPhone" front comes from iLab Factory which has pictures of a fully assembled device (sans internal electronics). The repositioned speaker jack is clearly evident along with the smaller, 19-pin dock connector. The assembled device also confirms that Apple is going with a two-tone design theme for the "New iPhone", with the volume button, power button, and upper/lower halves of the back plate matching the color of the front plate of the device.

This latest leak also confirms that Apple must really love the overall design aesthetic that was initiated with the iPhone 4. We're guessing that Jony Ive must subscribe to the Porsche method of revamping products by making changes so subtle that you have to squint very hard to notice the new design details from generation to generation (a la Porsche 911).

But enough rambling, here are the shots of the assembled "New iPhone":

There will ALWAYS be people whining about something. That's why scientists gather data --- REAL STATISTICS --- they don't listen to a few compelling anecdotes.

Look at the whining when every version of OSX comes out. There are ALWAYS bigmouths going on about how it sucks --- there were people like this for 10.0, and there are people like this for 10.8. But do they actually matter in the grand scheme of things? These people talk about how OSX now sucks and they plan to abandon it --- and then a year later we hear them making the same complaint about the new version of OSX.

You can live your life imaging that listening to these people provides you with valuable insight as to the state of the Mac universe. The rest of us will prefer to stick to rather more scientific data.

=================

If you imagine that iOS5 has the same functionality as iOS1 you are even more deluded. If you think there is no difference between new and old versions of iOS, USE an old version. I have an iPhone1 I use as an iPod Touch. It runs iOS3. Believe me --- iOS3 is VERY different from iOS5 in ways that I notice every day.

Just because you aren't aware of differences does not mean they are not there. I don't have iOS6, but I can tell you, for example, that Mountain Lion has a dramatically improved virtual memory system over Lion. Reviewers don't comment on it, benchmarks don't show it, but it's there if you know what to look for. And it makes a HUGE difference --- it's a large part of why the OS as a whole and Safari in particular just feel snappier even though you can't say exactly why.

The same thing happened in Lion which had dramatically improved disk IO performance over Snow Leopard for small files. Again not obvious unless you know what to look for, but it made tasks that touch many small files (for example rsync) run almost twice as fast.

Similar invisible plumbing has occurred in Mountain Lion in the Core Animation code --- no obvious changes, but things are that much faster and snappier.It's highly likely that these sorts of changes are also present in iOS6.

And don't pretend they don't matter --- the whole reason the Android world keeps raving about JB is not because of its new features, it's because its snappier and smoother. Why claim this is a good improvement for Android, but is meaningless for iOS?

He said that the new iPhone would come with a revamped OS. That's what sparked my response.

I'm sorry, but iOS 6 is NOT revamped compared to iOS 5; it's just a minor sidestep. I own both a third generation iPad and an iPhone 4S. My iPad is running iOS 6 Beta 3 and my iPad is running iOS 5.1.1 (Jailbroken).

iOS 6 adds Apple's own mapping technology (instead of Google's), but iOS already had a core Maps app, so that's a sidestep. Facebook integration, PassBook? Shared Photo Streams? I'm sorry, that is NOT a revamped OS.

About the biggest thing added to iOS 6 that I have enjoyed is the ability to upload photos natively in Safari versus having to rely on a jailbreak (Safari Uploader) to do it -- that was the ONLY reason that I jailbroke my iPad when it was running iOS 5.

And I didn't say that iOS 6 was functionally deficient -- I said operationally and visually it it is just like previous iOS versions. Navigating iOS 6 still operates and looks much like iOS 1 from the chicklet grid layout to the lock screen, to the way we navigate in and out of apps, to the lock screen that still doesn't give you something as basic as glanceable weather.

In many ways, iOS has been updated functionally to be a very powerful, modern mobile operating system. But compared to Windows Phone or Android, the ability to have "living, breathing" realtime data streams on the screen is where iOS really shows its age and feels like you're living in a 1.0 World.

This is especially apparent with the iPad with its large screen real estate. An iPad with rows and rows of static icons on every homepage is a productivity waste. No widgets, no news feeds, no live photo updates (ala Windows Phone)...not even a permanent widget on the homepage to show you realtime weather without having to click into an app?